“Stay close to me while I check the house.” The professor held out his hand and she studied it a minute before rising to her feet and taking it. A knot of emotions trapped her words. “Do you have a flashlight?”
Nodding, she dropped his hand and led him to the kitchen. She grabbed the cool handle of the solid flashlight sitting on the counter and handed it to him.
Its beam made everything not in its path seem even darker. The professor must have sensed her discomfort. “I’ll make sure you’re safe.”
A nervous giggle escaped her lips. “Yeah, the professor protecting an Amish woman.”
The professor moved toward the basement door. “Don’t underestimate me. Before I went back to college for my PhD, I was an army ranger.”
“I suppose that makes you tough?” She had heard of the army, of course, but she didn’t know what a ranger was. The Amish were conscientious objectors and didn’t believe in fighting in wars.
The professor opened the basement door and cast the beam of light down the stairs. “Tougher than most.” He gently squeezed her hand. “Stay right here. I’m going to check the basement.”
After a few long, tense-filled minutes, he emerged from the basement. “No one’s down there. Let’s check upstairs.”
She nodded, nerves getting the best of her.
As she skulked behind the professor, afraid to walk through her own home, she could already hear the church elders tsk-tsking over a man who wasn’t her husband going upstairs. Surely they’d understand. If they ever found out. Right now, the elders weren’t her biggest concern. Someone hiding under her bed or lurking in a dark corner was.
Fear knotted her stomach. She’d never be able to sleep tonight.
The professor pointed his chin toward the door at the top of the stairs. “Is this your bedroom?”
She nodded and emitted an indecipherable sound that she hoped he took as yes. She lingered in the doorway as the professor made a sweep of the room. Empty. He did the same in the room Grace and Katie, her young daughters, shared. She was grateful she had left them with her brother, Mark, and his family for the night. They were only six and eight and Rebecca wanted to provide as much consistency for them after everything they had been through in their young lives.
The last upstairs bedroom was Samuel’s. He kept the door shut. He had been doing that for the past few months, ever since Elmer had died. Rebecca immediately felt traitorous for letting this stranger into her son’s room. A room her son didn’t even allow her access to.
The professor gave her a quick nod, his face heavily shadowed in the hallway. He turned the handle and pushed the door open.
Rebecca skirted around the professor and turned on the kerosene lamp on the bedside table. She sucked in a gasp. The room was a mess. The quilt she had personally made for Samuel was askew on the bed. Papers littered the floor.
“Samuel hasn’t allowed me in here for months.”
A battery-powered radio sat in the corner, and an assortment of silver disks littered the floor around it. She walked over to the closet and picked up a thin laptop and turned it over in her hands. She willed away her nausea as she met the professor’s gaze. “I had no idea he had this.” She held up the computer in her hand. Before her job at the diner, where people came in to work for hours on these things at some of the best tables near the windows, she wouldn’t have known what it was. “I have no idea how he’d afford a laptop. Why would he need this?”
The professor slowly strolled the perimeter of the room. Was he mentally cataloging her son’s belongings as if his room were an exhibit in a museum? Her mouth grew dry. Feelings of betrayal welled up again. Why had she allowed this man who made a living studying the Amish into her son’s bedroom?
“Please don’t use this in your research. This is my family’s private business.” She didn’t want to give the church elders reason to not allow her son into the preparation classes for baptism next summer.
Her heart filled with self-recrimination. She should have never brought an outsider into her life. Their lives.
The professor finally spoke. “You didn’t know he had all these things?”
Rebecca shrugged. “I didn’t want to know.” She lowered herself onto the corner of the bed. “It’s not uncommon for the youngie to explore worldly things. I hoped after his father, he would have been less likely to stray.”
“You suspected something was going on. That’s why you came to me.” She tried to read the question he wasn’t asking. Did he now suspect Samuel of dealing drugs? How else would he have earned the money for these things? Slowly blinking, Rebecca wished she hadn’t listened to her gut. Wasn’t she happier before she knew what her husband was really up to? The same could be said for her son.
What did she really know?
Rebecca smoothed her fingers along the edge of her cap and nodded. “I can’t lose him. I can’t. My daughters would be devastated.”
I would be devastated.
“Do you notice anything missing?”
Rebecca lifted her head and looked around. “In here? I wouldn’t know.”
“What about in the rest of the house?”
“I don’t think so. I have nothing of value.”
“Maybe they wanted something your son had.”
Rebecca’s gaze swept across the room, a room completely foreign to her.
The professor pulled his cell phone out of his pocket. “I have to call the sheriff. Report a break-in.”
“You can’t.” Desperation made her chest tight.
“I don’t understand. Someone was in your house.” He stopped and turned to face her. “Do you know who it was?”
Rebecca shook her head. “Of course not.”
“I’m calling the sheriff.”
Rebecca watched as the professor dialed the number, then lifted the phone to his ear. She was helpless to stop him.
Rebecca had made a huge mistake.
* * *
Rebecca sat ramrod straight in the rocker across from the professor as they waited in the sitting room for the sheriff to arrive. She was kicking herself for approaching the professor. She should have kept everything in her family private.
Now look what they uncovered in Samuel’s bedroom.
And if she hadn’t wasted time going to the university, she wouldn’t have given the intruder an opportunity to break in.
Willard’s cruel, mocking voice scraped across her brain. Stupid, stupid woman.
Neh, neh, neh! She was not that woman anymore. She was strong. She had to be.
If you are so strong, why is Officer Maxwell on his way over here to nose into your business? The Amish are supposed to stay separate. In this world but not of this world. You’re going to screw things up and lose Samuel now. It wonders me how you’ll ever be respected by the Amish.
Rebecca squared her shoulders, trying to shake her husband’s mocking words free from her brain. She realized her argument was flawed. The intruder could have made his way into her home while she was there. Then what would have happened? She could have been hurt or worse.
The memory of the man advancing on her on campus flashed in her mind. Were these events related? Had graffiti and egg-throwing veered toward more dangerous personal attacks? Would the